This month marks 40 years since Walkabout Gourmet Adventures began, with founders Graeme and Gabriela Clarke building a company on a simple idea: walking, nature, good food and introducing travellers to places they might otherwise struggle to experience.
The Australian family-owned business remains founder-led today, with both Graeme and Gabriela still actively involved – Graeme continuing to develop and personally lead journeys, and Gabriela working across the business much as she has since the beginning, from shaping the culinary side of the earliest Australian trips to helping build the company’s expansion into Europe.
“While Walkabout has evolved considerably over four decades, it remains guided by the same people and principles on which it was founded,” Graeme said.
The numbers behind the milestone are considerable: Walkabout has welcomed more than 6,000 guests across over 1,000 tours in 15 countries since 1986, and the company describes itself as one of Victoria’s longest-running walking tour operators.
A simple beginning
Walkabout’s origins trace back to Graeme and Gabriela’s years in Europe, where they came to love the walking regions of Germany, France and Switzerland. Returning to Australia, they set about turning that passion into a business.
The idea in 1986 was remarkably low-tech. Wilsons Promontory National Park was difficult for international visitors to reach without their own transport, so the Clarkes began visiting Melbourne youth hostels on Thursday evenings, showing travellers slides of the Prom and inviting them to join a three-day trip departing the following day.
Their first vehicle was a second-hand 18-seat Mazda Parkway, with the rear six seats removed to make room for luggage and supplies. From Wilsons Promontory, the program expanded into the Grampians, Great Ocean Road, Victorian High Country, Croajingolong National Park and Kosciuszko National Park – and word spread quickly enough that Walkabout was soon carrying more Australian guests than international visitors.
The early tours were hands-on in every sense. Graeme and Gabriela would walk with guests during the day, then return to camp, a farmhouse or a lodge to prepare three-course dinners, breakfasts and gourmet picnic lunches themselves.
That founding philosophy – highly personalised, guided small-group journeys combining beautiful natural environments with good food, distinctive accommodation and a genuine connection to place – remains at the heart of the business 40 years on.
“The destinations – and certainly the level of comfort – have evolved enormously, but the fundamental philosophy has changed remarkably little,” Graeme said.
“It really feels like only yesterday that we were setting up our stand at the Melbourne Travel Exhibition in 1986 to launch Walkabout Gourmet Adventures.
“Since then, it has been an incredible journey exploring beautiful walking destinations across Australia and around the world. While the destinations have been extraordinary, what has truly kept us going are the wonderful guests we’ve had the privilege of travelling with. Many have become lifelong friends, and that has been the greatest reward of all.”
From niche concept to established category
When Walkabout launched, the idea of a “gourmet walking holiday” was a difficult sell. Traditional bushwalkers weren’t necessarily interested in the food element, and the broader travel market hadn’t yet caught up to the concept of pairing walking with a more comfortable, culinary experience.
Forty years on, walking and experiential travel has become a significant category in its own right, with far more operators in the market and strong growth in self-guided walking holidays. Walkabout, however, has deliberately stayed focused on guided journeys.
“A guide provides far more than navigation,” the founders said. “It’s the knowledge, stories, relationships and understanding of a region that allow guests to experience a destination more deeply – much of which can be missed when travelling independently.”
Traveller expectations have shifted too. Walkabout’s earliest Australian trips involved camping, with the Clarkes personally catering every meal; today’s guests expect a greater degree of comfort, and the company now works with carefully selected hotels, restaurants and local partners – though the emphasis on personal service hasn’t changed.
The power of repeat business
Perhaps the clearest measure of Walkabout’s model is its guest loyalty. On many tours today, around 70 per cent of participants have travelled with the company before, and on some departures that figure reaches 100 per cent. On Graeme’s upcoming From the Sea to the Summits journey, 90 per cent of guests are repeat travellers, with the remainder friends of those already booked – among them Bruce and Cathy, who first travelled with Walkabout in 1992 and are returning 34 years later.
One story stands out for the founders: a guest who joined Walkabout’s easiest program, the Snail Trail, in 2010, then kept returning over the following years, gradually taking on more difficult journeys. Eventually she joined a Swiss tour and walked to the Faulhorn in the high Swiss Alps – the highest point reached on any Walkabout tour – becoming emotional near the summit as she reflected on how far she’d come from having little confidence in her walking ability.
“Those moments are enormously rewarding for us as guides,” the founders said. “The destination matters, of course, but seeing what travel can give somebody personally is really what stays with you.”
Other guests have stayed in Walkabout’s memory for different reasons. In 1996, a family travelled on the Sea to the Summits journey with their two children, then aged seven and 13 – a reminder, the company says, that meaningful travel isn’t bound by age. Elsewhere, a group who first met on a Walkabout tour more than 25 years ago still holds regular reunions today.
One experience that particularly stands out involved a guest who first joined their easiest walking program, the Snail Trail, in 2010.
“The idea of that journey was quite literally to travel at a snail’s pace,” Graeme said.
She completed it successfully and returned to travel with us over subsequent years, gradually increasing the difficulty of the journeys she undertook.
“Eventually she joined one of our Swiss tours and walked to the Faulhorn in the high Swiss Alps, the highest point reached on any of our walking tours. As she approached the summit, she became emotional as she realised how far she had come — from having very little confidence in her walking ability to literally climbing a mountain.
“Those moments are enormously rewarding for us as guides.”
That loyalty has also reshaped the trade side of the business. Travel agents were crucial in the early years, when Walkabout was completely unknown, but as repeat business and word of mouth grew – aided by early guests who went on to complete more than 10 journeys each and brought along groups of friends – the company became considerably less reliant on agents to generate bookings. Direct relationships with guests are now a major part of the business, though Walkabout continues to value the trade’s role in connecting travellers with specialist operators.
Weathering the pandemic
Like the rest of the travel industry, Walkabout’s toughest test came during COVID-19, when closed international borders paused its overseas tours for almost three years. Rather than stand still, the company used the downtime to develop new Australian walking holidays, and when travel resumed in 2023 it expanded its domestic collection across multiple states while continuing to run its established European program.
Growing the portfolio
Walkabout’s 40-plus journeys now span Australia, Europe, Asia, Africa and the Middle East, a portfolio built through a mix of organic growth, guest suggestions and broader travel trends. The company’s first European tours – the European Triangle through Alsace, the Black Forest and Swiss Alps, and the Romantic Path through Bavaria, Austria and the Dolomites – launched as early as 1988.
More recent additions, such as Provence, Tuscany and Iceland, reflect wider travel trends, though the founders stress a destination is only added when it fits the Walkabout philosophy.
The company’s Walkabout Stays accommodation offering, anchored by La Résidence Saint Mary in Provence, began in 2000 and grew out of the company’s long-standing connection to the region. Guests often stay at the property before or after a Walkabout journey, while the accommodation and touring sides of the business have always complemented one another.
New journeys are also in development to mark the milestone, including 15-day trips to Tasmania, a Rwanda and Uganda gorilla safari, and a South Korea walking tour, alongside an on-demand Iceland Explorer itinerary for private groups of six or more.
Community and what comes next
Sustainability and community impact remain central to the Walkabout model, largely through small group sizes and long-term relationships with local accommodation, restaurant and guide partners. In Rundu, Namibia, the company has supported a local primary school through donations and supplies and organises guest visits to build a more personal connection with the community.
For the anniversary itself, Walkabout is considering a gathering for long-time travellers rather than a blanket discount – similar to a guest reunion held in Victoria for the company’s 25th anniversary – potentially combining a walk with a hosted lunch or dinner.
“We feel the anniversary should recognise the people who have helped make those 40 years possible,” Graeme said.
Looking ahead, Graeme and Gabriela Clarke see nature-based travel becoming increasingly important, pointing to Walkabout’s first African safari in 2014 as a turning point in understanding how guests respond to wildlife experiences. With the couple now based back in Australia, after roughly 30 years predominantly in Europe, the company also plans to renew its focus on Australian touring alongside its international program.
“We don’t see the next decade as being about becoming bigger for the sake of growth,” Graeme said. “It’s about continuing to find exceptional places, refining the journeys we already offer and developing new ones where we believe Walkabout can bring something distinctive.”
“Moving forward, we still have plenty of ideas for new destinations and hope to continue welcoming many more guests into the future.”
Forty years on, they say, the aim remains the same as it was in 1986: to take people somewhere worth discovering, walk through it rather than simply pass through it, eat well along the way, and make the experience personal.
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